Nokia's Ovi Store hitting 5m downloads a day

Apple's iOS App Store and Google's Android Market may be getting all that attention, but Nokia's Ovi Store has itself been ticking over quite nicely, thankyou very much.

Nokia has just dished up a whole swathe of new stats to prove its point, as well as give a fresh slant on how ditching Symbian is not quite as simple as turning out the light and closing the door.

Nokia no doubt intends for Windows Phone developers to start pushing their apps onto the Ovi Store later this year, but in the meantime the figures don't make for bad reading as they are.

The Nokia community worldwide are gobbling up in the region of five million downloads a day, with a total of 158 developers in 41 different countries having seen their apps hit the magical one million downloads mark.

Indeed, the combination of a 200 million-strong smartphone user base and the convenience of operator billing through a total of 112 different operators in 36 markets is clearly a winning formula for Nokia, and has been the catalyst behind the Ovi Store's eight-fold expansion in the past year alone.

Side-stepping the potentially thorny issue of Symbian's long-term future, Nokia sees in-app billing (currently being beta tested) and the evolution of the basic Series 40 operating system as the next steps in taking the Ovi Store forward.

We're used to thinking about the concept of a 'third ecosystem' in terms of OS market share – that's certainly what both Nokia and Microsoft have in mind for their Windows Phone alliance. Yet Nokia might actually be doing itself a disservice here, as – looking at its app store at least – it's pretty clear the Finns are already there.

Just check out the latest daily builds of Graviy for Symbian, or SPB's Mobile Shell, or DiffTack etc etc...there is definitely life in Symbian, and good devs can build apps that compare quite nicely with what's available for Android and iOS. And PR 2 - aka Anna - will bring better qt support. Using Gravity 1.5 you feel like you're using an iPhone. Don't believe it? Your loss

Well,
they still haven't really jumped ship, yet. They know, and have stated as much, that the deal with Microsoft may flop - for that reason alone they will continue to release new Symbian devices well into 2013. Contractual reasons demand they keep supporting those phones for another 2 years... That's is 2015.
Now, if the WP7 deal fails, will they just stop making phones altogether?
The Nokia N8 shows there's still demand for their high-end devices. I also don't doubt the E7 will do well, as will the E6. Then, with the C7, they basically released a good alround smartphone at the price of a good feature-phone. Even US reviews give the C7/Astound fairly good reviews...
So there, it's not a ghostship, yet. All the while we do not know what else is going to happen?!
I see eg a future for Android that would include a multi-tier brand - 'feature phone' Android vs high end - that way Google could fight fragmentation and refute accusations that some Android phones really do not have the power for Gingerbread and whtever else is coming.
Microsoft, rumour has it, are already considering a cheaper line of WP7 handsets with lowered specs. And no wonder - look at the prices for the first batch of WP7 devices. They are already available with up to 25% off. At the same time Vodafone here in Ireland, eg, still sell the 1st HTC Desire for the same price it cost upon launch. And even the old Htc Hd2 with winmo 6.5 still sells at its launch price.
Next up Blackberry: did any ONE of the analysts predict in 2008 that BBs would be the 2010/11 hit with teens and young adults? No, they didn't! There are millions of young adults and their first taste of smartphone is Blackberry. Not iOS or Android.
We will see.